The Secret Within
by Azkam Shazam
Summary: After five years of  New Earth's existence, Cale and Akima enjoy life on "Planet Bob" as it grows with leaps and bounds. However, their peace is disturbed by an unexpected threat, and they find themselves once again racing to save the human race.


**Disclaimer: I do not own Titan A.E. It belongs to its respective company. **

**Note: Wow, this is my first sci-fi story. After watching _Titan A.E. _I couldn't resist writing a story about , I know it has OCs in it, but not too many, I promise!  
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**Anyways, I hope you enjoy this story! **

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><p>Mises-1.<p>

Home to the galaxy's most notorious drifter bar, full of shady characters of all moralities and species. Begrimed and worn down, it drifted in and out of Mises-1's orbit and spacecraft docked at odd intervals.

Regular maintenance repairs for Mises-1 were not an option when hardened criminals started brawls that could obliterate half the station in one fell swoop, so small ones were made intermittently.

"Man, 'bout time our drinks came, I'm parched!"

Two companions sat at a discolored wooden table in one corner of the noisy bar, out of most of the room's sight. The complaining man was a small and weasely-looking Urinithian, a rat-looking type of species. His small beady eyes depicted greed and his movements were quick and eager. He had sandy-blond hair that resembled a bird's nest and his long pink tail wound comfortably around the legs of his chair.

His human companion was darker in nature, eyes sweeping suspiciously around the bar and long dark brown hair covering most of his face. He did not like this place, too many secrets passed around and no fresh air free of tension. He did not like this place.

Not one bit.

A Hytherian waiter arrived at their table holding a tray laden with two bottles filled with a bubbling liquid that glowed iridescent blue. The waiter's six arms stuck out at odd angles, like grass blades growing at abnormal rates. It placed their drinks down its and four crab-like eyes and pincher mouth unsettled Sandy, who looked down at the table and muttered, _"Darned aliens, why do they always have to be so creepy? You said they had to be creepy?" _

Brown noticed Sandy's discomfort, for his whiskers were twitching nervously, and decided to have a little fun. "Please sir, tell us; Is it true that Hythera is to buy star system Ulypus from the Rysisans? What is your say in the matter?"

The waiter started to click and chirp, its crab-like mouth moving. The antenna waved animatedly like a flagpole on a windy day. Brown nodded, not really understanding but effectively convincing the waiter he was.

Sandy seemed ready to rip his companion's head off for keeping the Hytherian at their table, and shot Brown a deadly glare. Finally the waiter finished his explanation and skittered to the next table.

"Don't ever do that again, asshole, or I'll rip you a new one." Sandy threatened, glowering at his companion.

"I'm _so _scared, Yath. Your threats are _so_ very threatening."

Yath's eyes bulged indignantly, but Brown merely said grinning and taking a swig, "Drink up."

As he took a swig, Yath glanced around the bar, taking in all the bar's occupants. Some were big and hairy, some were small and scaly. Some had intricate tattoos all over their faces and arms while others had brightly colored spots.

Ugh, where in God's name did these _things _come from?

"Why did you bring me here?" Yath asked, lowering his voice and clutching his bottle.

Brown merely grinned and leaned back in his chair. "It's a place of comfort, is it not? The perfect place to get your dirty work done."

"Shale, get a life."

Shale placed a hand on his chest, face displaying mock hurt. "I'm wounded!"

His face turned serious again, and he said, "I failed the mission."

Silence ensued at their table, and Yath tried not to look around nervously.

"You. Did. _What?_" Yath hoarsely whispered eyes wide with fear.

Now grim, Shale looked down at the table. "It was too hard, I couldn't do it. They are looking for me now, that's for sure."

Yath realized his buddy was in serious trouble, for the Granerians are not friendly initially.

Imagine when you fail a mission they assigned you.

"You didn't steal it? Why the hell not? It's rock for crying out loud!"

"Shaddup! Do you want the whole station to know? Besides, we're going to have to steal a ship and book it out of here anyway."

Yath shook his head and slumped in his chair, defeated by the news.

"Tell me what happened." he finally said.

Shale took a deep breath and began the story of his failed mission in a hushed tone, and Yath had to lean in to hear him.

"The Granerians are known for their great archeology and uncovering of rare fossils and gemstones, right?" Here Yath nodded dismissively.

" They're also not a very friendly species, even once you get to know 'em. Imagine their fury when an Earthly archeologist uncovers the most complete skeleton of a Furintha ever known in the history of the galaxy on a small uncharted planet just parsecs away from their home world of Granera."

"What's the name of the archeologist?"

"Stutley. Willam Stutley is the guy's name. Anyway, Stutley was awarded many honors and all that crap, and decided to throw an enormous party on a freighter ship he rented for the space.

The Granerians decided they needed two hit men on Stutley and they called me up and another fellow."

"But you're a thief, not an…"

"I know, I know!" Shale's glare told Yath to shut up and not interrupt, and fortunately Yath took the hint.

"As I was saying, they hired me and another guy, a human assassin by the name of Augox. I was to steal the fossil, as small as it was at just three feet long, and Augox was to kill Stutley. We were required to work together, and be paid five hundred k credits a pop if we were successful."

Yath let out a low whistle. "That ain't bad."

"Naw, you should have heard what they were originally gonna pay us." Shale dryly remarked.

"So we took a small ship and followed the massive freighter for many parsecs when we decided to make our move and board undetected. We dropped into the cargo hold and Augox changed into his disguise; A bright pink suit with a yellow bow tie."

Yath was by now snickering, and Shale leered at him. "I should tell you about Augox, he doesn't do happiness. He sticks a knife in your ribs and lets you die laughing."

Yath's smile abruptly dropped.

"Idiot Stutley decided he wanted a theme to his dumb party and it was to dress in colors that clashed horrendously."

_Augox came out to the bathroom, and Shale had to look twice to make sure he wasn't hallucinating. _

_Augox in yellow? _

_Augox in pink? _

"_If you say on word of this, I will deal with you personally. Got it?" Augox growled, and Shale nodded promptly. _

_This was great blackmail material. Shale liked it. _

_Quite much. _

"The fossil was in a glass display case on a table covered with purple cloth. All I had to do was drill a hole under the table and put a fake fossil in place of the real one. It was real dark, so it wasn't to be an issue of me being seen. Augox just had just come up behind Stutley and…well you get the picture."

"And your costume was…?"

Shale averted his eyes, and scowled. "Does it really matter that you know?" he said.

Yath eagerly eyed Shale, expectant for his friend's answer. He wasn't going to miss this opportunity to get back at Shale.

Shale sighed. His costume had nothing to do with the story, it was irreverent!

This little weasel was going to pay one day.

"It was a purple suit with pink shoes and a yellow safari hat."

Yath burst out laughing, pounding his fist on the dirty table and causing their bottles to jump violently. A few bar members looked over as Yath piercingly squeaked, and Shale felt virtually every pair of eyes in the bar boring into the back of his neck.

"Dumbass, shut up. It's not that funny." Shale tried to calm Yath down, but his buddy was literally gone with the wind. Tears streaked down his face and his face was cherry tomato red.

Shale was nervous. Yath was drawing way too much attention to them, and his contractors could be in the bar for all he knew. He hated not having the upper hand; he was a thief after all. He didn't like it.

Not one bit.

Shale kicked Yath in the shin under the table, and Yath cursed loudly, the foul word tumbling from his lips easily.

"What's that for?" Yath said angrily.

"That's not for shuttin' your trap, I didn't even finish my story!"

"So we walked into the main are of the ship, and the place was packed. A disco ball hung from the ceiling and I had never seen so many balloons in my life. We then split up to make our mission go quicker. Augox was to get Stutley drunk enough and alone so he could make it appear Stutley had merely fallen asleep. A deep sleep I might add.

I had to practically fight my way over to the display case, so many damn people.

That's when everything went wrong."

Shale took a deep breath.

"The music changed from a slow classical style to a heavy techno beat, and everyone started jumping up and down. This severely obese lady in a pink tutu with green lace was next to me and she mashed my foot. I of course, winced and bent over to check if my toes were still intact, but when I stood up idiot bumped into me and I collided with her."

Yath chortled, and Shale continued, determined to ignore him.

"She said sorry and asked me my name. I did not intend to have a code name, so I made one up on the spot and donned an accent. I practically shouted it.

"_My name is Aldolpho." _

"_Sorry, what did you say?" _

"_My name is Aldolpho." _

"_What?" _

My accent was Italian, and she unfortunately thought this was very attractive and proceeded to cling to me like Fratheian slime."

Shale put a hand over his face, and sighed angrily. Yath was enjoying this way too much. Shale did not like being embarrassed.

Not one bit.

"She "danced" and I struggled to maneuver around her. She was so big, I virtually ricocheted off her and I tried to loose her. She clung to me like glue, Yath! And she was always grabbing my arm, cutting off circulation whenever a song she liked came on, which I just couldn't damn believe was every single one that came on.

The communicator in my ear suddenly buzzed and Augox confirmed he had completed his part of the mission. I couldn't shout into it, I told Beluga, I don't even know her name, I had to go pee.

"_Aldolpho must take the pissssss." _

"I informed Augox in the bathroom that I wasn't even under the table, and I swear, I have never been verbally abused so badly before in my life.

I finally somehow got under the table and took out my small plasma knife. Then, the lights went out and the whole ship shuddered."

Yath raised his eyebrows.

"It turned out the ship accidently got caught in a meteor storm and people were starting to evacuate. I was just going to swipe the damn thing in all the confusion, but then the ship practically split in half then, so I booked it out of there with Augox."

"_You don't have it? Shame, I had looked forward to skinning you alive." _

"So then what happened?" Yath asked.

"I put the Granerian guards sent to collect me on a merry chase and ended up here." Shale said.

Yath nervously looked around once more, and what caught his eye sent shivers down his spine.

Three Granerian imperial guards were at the bar's entrance, their scaly skin and pointed snouts with razor sharp teeth immediately putting Yath on edge. How could they have followed them so easily, Mises-1 was practically fifty parsecs away! Yath knew he had to make a decision, one that didn't involve them becoming French fries due to the work of Granerian laser guns.

He'd have to make one fast.

"Uh…Uh…" Shale's eyebrows knotted in confusion, "Do you need to pee? Spit it out!" "They're here! Whadd'we gonna do?" Yath said, trying to make himself smaller in his seat and inconspicuous.

Shale groaned to himself. He knew the Granerians wouldn't give up, not after his failure. He had craftily led them on a merry chase, and it had worked so far. He just needed to make up a new plan, given a little time.

"Here, we can jack a ship. A small one. I think I know just the one." Shale said, and with that got up. He carefully kept his face from view of the entrance and Yath scuttled after him, their drinks unforgotten.

They wound their way through the mess of bodies and loud din of voices and laughter. Yath hoped his buddy's plan worked, for he wasn't ready to find out if it didn't. He swallowed a pang of fear and a shudder ran from his spin down to the very tip of his tail.

Suddenly a large pig-faced creature with a double chin stepped into their way, a large grin adorning his face. "Shale! It is good to see you, my friend! What brings you to this wonderful mess of a place?" the creature said a little too loudly, causing Shale to wince.

"_Not now, Pix." _Shale plastered a fake smile on his face, heart beating painfully in his chest. He didn't have time to stop, not with Granerians on his tail. "Listen, I will catch up with you later, I kinda need to go." Shale abruptly turned to leave, but Pix noticed Yath and grabbed his hand, pumping it rigorously up and down. Yath felt his teeth rattle in his skull, and tried to grin good naturedly at the eccentric Pix. "How are you doing, young Yath?"

"Uh...Nice to see you too. Uh..." Yath started timidly, not remembering who this person was and if he had a name. and Pix started to jabber. Shale inwardly cursed and looked for the guards. A few of the bartenders and waiters were giving directions to the guards.

"_Damn it, we gotta go, we gotta go…" _

One of the guards locked eyes with Shale, and informed his associates, who picked up their pace.

Shale impatiently ripped Yath from the one-sided conversation he was having with Pix, literally dragging him along. He knew he couldn't break into a run just yet, there were too many people.

Unexpectedly a shot rang out in the crowded room and many people shrieked, dropping to the floor. Like a sprinter at a track and field race, Shale shot forward and Yath dropped to all fours and hurried after him.

They reached a hallway with a T-shaped crossing. "This way, to the hanger!" Shale said. He could hear the guards closing in, and feel their hot smelly breath breathing down his neck…

"Halt. Under the order of the Granerian Council we place you under arrest."

Several Granerian guards blocked the entrance to the hanger bay, laser guns pointed at Yath and Shale. Shale felt all his hope be extinguished, a candle light blown readily out. Yath squealed in surprise.

"You got us; I'll have to hand it to you." Shale said, and put his hands up. The guards moved forward precisely and cuffed the two companions and frog-marched them out to the hanger bay.

A large ship was parked in the middle of the hanger, a ramp extending to the ground from its large hull.

"They didn't kill us, so..." Yath started. "Silence, insolent rat!" one guard barked, and stepped on Yath's tail, who screeched loudly. "Asses, that's what they are…" Yath muttered angrily and nursed his tail.

Shale contemplated Yath's brief words. They certainly weren't barbequed right now, so what could they possibly want? Anxiety plagued Shale as he pondered his fate, and his stomach felt as if rith-rith flies were buzzing around inside.

Whatever his fate was, it wouldn't be good. Shale didn't like not controlling his life.

Not one bit.

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><p><strong>Review please! I appreciate any feedback! Thanks! Don't worry, Cale and Akima <em>will<em> show up in the next chapter! **


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